Color and Contrast
by superbestfriends
Summary: Hate, that was too strong of a word, but to say he disliked him...well, that just wasn’t strong enough. Craig/Tweek. Co-written by eksley05 and tweekers.
1. Chapter 1

**Color And Contrast**

**A/N**: Ohay, it's tweekers. :D One half of superbestfriends. The other half is eksley05 and this is our baby, CAC. Our co-Creek if you will. Because everyone knows the world needs more Creek. All right so here's the basic set up: I, tweekers, will write a chapter from Craig's pov, then the awesome eksley05 will write one from Tweek's. And so on and so on. It's going to be kind of epic. Maybe. We'll see. Without further ado (besides the further ado)...**  
Warnings**: Craig, he's an enigma all his own. And you know, slash and South Park kids all grown up into adult teenagers with gay urges. **  
Pairings**: Craig/Tweek. And you guys know us, there'll probably be some other stuff on the side, we'll see.  
**Disclaimer**: Matt Stone and Trey Parker belong to South Park...or something like that.

**Chapter One**: Open Book

In the morning Craig Nommel was not a bright ray of happiness and sunshine.

Actually, you would not be far off if you said that he was never a bright ray of happiness and sunshine and that anyone who was put on top of the list of people that the world would really be better without. Although, that was a long list and there were certainly some people who ranked in the top five that were more dark rays of anti-Semitism and the excessive intake of any and all food products. In all truth, Craig was not a fan of people in general.

Waking up was, in Craig's opinion, the worst part of the day, which probably attributed to his normally unhappy morning attitude. He did it no less than three times every morning and was currently on the fourth time that particular morning. Usually he was awakened by his alarm clock, the one that no one – save his parents, but they had probably forgotten by now – knew he had. The alarm clock was old and it was only by the grace of Japanese technology that it was still working. It woke Craig up every morning to what was, quite possibly, the most embarrassing thing ever which was why no one knew he owned it.

It was a Red Racer alarm clock and Craig hid it in the back of closet most of the time. In fact, Craig hid a lot of things in his closet, literally. And possibly figuratively as well, but that was an abstract thought that would not have interested Craig, so it's better left to the imagination as to just what, if anything, was hidden in the non-existent closet. As for the real closet, well, there were a lot of things in. Clothes that weren't mostly black were hung up on hangers, not having been worn in some time, while clothes that were mostly black were strewn across his floor.

There were empty cigarette packs, a broken umbrella, Red Racer Seasons one through four on DVD, love notes from middle school, pens that had long run out of ink, CDs of bands that were technically too conformist for his lifestyle, underwear that wasn't his, underwear that was his, angsty poetry, angsty pictures, angsty everything, the gym class uniform from ninth grade, every homework assignment that had ever been forgotten, really old pieces of gum, photographs of memories long forgotten and, on that non-existent side of life, a few skeletons as well.

And, normally, once Craig woke up, he would unplug the Red Racer alarm clock – if only to get the obnoxious theme song it played to wake him up to stop – and throw it into the closet as well before closing the doors and picking out an outfit from the floor of his room. But that day Craig had looked at the clock, turned off the alarm, and left it there. Chances were if he was going anywhere, anyway, it would be to Henrietta's house. Because if Craig was going to be honest with himself he never, ever wanted the people he called his friends to come into his house.

An important thing to know about Craig was that he did _not _enjoy wearing the things he did. More than anything it was a shock factor on both sides of the electric fence. His so-called friends were alright with almost everything he wore, they just didn't like his hat. Everyone else, on the other hand, always squinted at him and seemed to be wondering how he had gotten from the slightly temperamental, but still rather normal, boy he had once been, to, well, whatever the hell he was now. Stereotypically, one of the Goth Kids, but otherwise a slightly temperamental, but still rather normal boy who just so happened to dress like those kids that were certain they were the epitome of non-conformism.

So when Craig put on his jeans, the ones that were so tight he was almost positive they cut off blood flow at some point during the day, he wasn't putting them on because they made him look good or because he really enjoyed barely being able to breathe. And when he found a generic band shirt that he had gotten at some store in the mall that was considered by the people he hung out with to be the least conformist, he didn't really like that band. When he was done brushing his teeth and running a hand through his naturally straight and slightly too-long hair and he put just a bit of eyeliner on he wasn't trying to accentuate his dark blue eyes.

He was just trying to fit in with the people who thought they stood out and trying to stand out amongst the people who thought he was absolutely ridiculous. The best part of it all was, unarguably, the fact that Craig wasn't even the stupidest looking in his group of, if you could call them that, friends. Well, at least not until he put on his hat, because _that _was the real reason he stood out no matter where he went. Without the hat Craig would have been your average, every day, conforming to non-conformist standards, Goth Kid.

But, no, he wore the same hat he had worn for years, bright blue with that dreadfully optimistic yellow puffball on the top. It was the final touch to his already odd look, a fuck you without his trademark action, to everyone he could possibly want to say fuck you to. Oddly enough the rest of the Goth Kids seemed to respect him for it. As Sid had put it once, well, what was more non-conformist than _not _conforming to the rest of them? And so Craig was then on revered as the ultimate non-conformist and, whether he liked it or not, was the unofficial new leader, ever since Freddie had graduated the year before.

And, besides that, Craig looked phenomenal. In his own mind, at least.

That morning, though, was just a bit different than any other. He got ready, wearing much the same outfit he had worn the day before, putting on his hat before he left his room because no one, no one at all, ever saw him without his hat, and didn't eat breakfast, because, really, he needed to fit into those pants somehow, and that was all pretty standard. What wasn't standard, however, was the fact that he was in a pretty decent mood.

Now, despite what people might have thought about Craig Nommel, he didn't really buy into the 'life is pain' philosophy that his friends did. Sure life kind of sucked and, even worse, nothing ever really changed, but it wasn't a dark pit of decaying organisms and blood from the broken hearts that were perpetually being inflicted upon them all. No, that was a little – well that was kind of gay, really, and Craig didn't see life as being all that bad. Certain aspects were hell and when he needed to be in hating-life-unconditionally mode he thought about those things and of course he hated life at that point.

But still it was morning, and he wasn't what anyone would have called a morning person, much less a ray of happiness and sunshine. Most of the time he was simply indifferent to things, not caring one way or the other. Things like school, for instance, the place he went to five days a week. It consumed a lot of his time, he had been there for well over eleven years now, but Craig didn't have much of an opinion on it. He didn't love it, but he didn't hate it either. And such was life, really, in his mind and it was how it always had been.

While Craig walked to school, which wasn't very far away from his house, he knew most of the other people his age were either on the bus or in their cars. After all, when in South Park one wouldn't have found it very pleasant to be outside at seven in the morning. To top it all off Craig didn't even wear a jacket – because, God, how conformist would that have been – and it didn't take much to figure out that he was more than a little cold.

Park High School was a lot louder and much better at good-mood killing than one would have expected. Class didn't officially start until twenty minutes after seven and in a town as small as South Park no one lived very far away from the school. Basically, everyone was there earlier and most of them were hanging out with their friends outside or in the halls. That wasn't the good-mood killer. The good-mood killer was, and there was no doubt in Craig's mind that this was true, anyone and everyone who chose to try and make you do something before the bell rang to signal the beginning of school.

One of these people was Wendy Testaburger and though Craig knew fully well that Wendy couldn't stand him she tried to make him do something every single morning.

"Craig, hey," she said, just like she had every morning for months now. Craig did a quick assessment of the date – May first, that meant there was probably something new she wanted them all to try and save. "You know I'm the president of the Ecology Club." Yeah, President of all the three members, Craig wanted to say in answer, but instead he said what he always said.

"Yes, Wendy, I know."

"Okay, well do you think you'd like to – "

"No." And just like always he flipped her off and walked away. It had become sort of a routine. Wendy asked just about everyone if they would like to come to the Ecology Club's next meeting. But no one ever went besides Stan Marsh, who was forced to go by Wendy, Kyle Broflovski, who was forced to go by Stan, and Butters Stotch, who was just plain into gay shit like ecosystems and saving whales. Craig didn't have time for animals and nature; he was too busy worrying about people.

"Got any cigarettes?" was also part of morning activity. The person who asked varied from time to time, but whether it was Sid or Henrietta didn't really matter, because Craig's answer was always the same.

"Of course." Then he reached into his pocket and threw the pack of cigarettes to Sid, who had been the one to ask that morning, and Sid had swept his red and black bangs out of his eyes to look at the brand – like it really mattered – before he lit up. "You guys going to school today?" Craig asked, shaking his head when Sid offered the cigarettes back to him.

"School?" Henrietta answered, like that was simply the most ludicrous statement she had ever heard in her life. "With all those Justin Timberlake wannabes?" She narrowed her eyes at two people in particular and Craig turned to see Stan Marsh talking to Clyde Donovan. Both of them were rather normal and, quite honestly, only looked like Justin Timberlake if you were high and squinted a little. Craig looked back at Henrietta as she continued. "I don't even know how you can stand being around all of them every day."

"Yeah, and why does that girl in the purple sweater always come up to talk to you?" Sid added, narrowing his eyes as he took a drag from the freshly lit cigarette he held. "God, conformist bitch."

"Yeah," Craig agreed, although he really didn't. On all counts Craig did not like Wendy and sometimes she could be headstrong and intrusive into one's personal business, but she wasn't exactly a bitch and much less a conformist one. But he was supposed to hate anyone and everything that could somehow be seen as the same as something else, so 'hate' Wendy Testaburger he did. "I think I'm going to go to class though, so I guess I'll see you guys later."

"We're going for coffee today," Henrietta said, as Craig turned to walk away. He stopped, sighed, but didn't say anything else before walking away. He had avoided it long enough, anyway, he was going to have to get coffee with them at some point, he just really didn't want it to be today. Today was going to be an alright day, maybe not perfect or wonderful, but sure as hell not shitty like his days usually were. Perhaps he would even put in a little effort – his grades weren't exactly the best in the world.

To Craig the whole divide at school was stupid. The fact that everyone had their own little groups and very rarely branched out of them. They acted like, within those groups, they were all so alike and had the same interests and same musical tastes. It was bullshit. You could see it in the way people walked. The way they talked and if they dotted their i's and crossed their t's at the very end or not. The color of their backpack and the frequency of their voice. No one was really the alike and no one was really different for the same reasons.

They were all the same for being different and Craig didn't get why it had been decided that they all needed their own little groups to stay in at all times, lest they be caught out in the open without their 'friends' and torn to pieces by the bigger packs of popular kids. He had seen it happen before, to the unsuspecting, self-conscious kids, in their Old Navy discount sweaters and brand new Chuck Taylor's, realizing that high school was more of a shithole than they could have imagined.

It was times like these that Craig thanked the almighty for his cocky attitude. Maybe he was the only Goth Kid that regularly attended classes, but he did it unflinchingly so and no one really messed with him. Well, all right, a lot of people messed with him, but Craig didn't mind it so much as secretly found it amusing. The fact that people he used to be friends with looked at him like he had gone insane over the past few years, it made him laugh inside because who really cared?

The clothes didn't define him, he didn't even like the clothes, the clothes were just to get reactions out of people who otherwise wouldn't have given him the time of day.

First hour was another one of those good-mood killers. It came in the form of Debate class. Craig did not want to be in Debate class. He was senior, after all, and most of the kids in Debate class were either freshmen or sophomores who had failed their required public speaking class. Craig hadn't failed, he had just not taken the class in his ninth grade year, just like the rest of his friends, because they would be damned if they were going to take the mandatory classes, that's what everyone else was doing.

And by this point – senior year – the school wasn't feeling too lenient towards Craig, so they couldn't just give him regular Speech class, oh no, he had received Debate. Honestly, Craig liked the class if he could get through it without noticing a certain student. So far in the semester he had succeeded in winning the two debates he had been in, mostly because the freshmen he was against seemed intimidated enough to piss themselves when the teacher pitted them against Craig Nommel.

No, the problem was not the class. It was that one student, the only other senior in the class. Tweek Tweak, who sat in pretty much the center of the classroom for no apparent reason. Craig could have told you exactly why he did not like Tweek. He didn't hate the blond boy, that was too strong of a word, but to say he disliked him…well, that just wasn't strong enough. The way that Craig felt about Tweek was something that only he could really understand but never fully put into words.

Not only was Tweek constantly making little outbursts and freaking out over things that could never happen, he also drank coffee all the time. Craig definitely hated coffee. He hated it like most people hated politicians. It was part of his daily life – his parents drank coffee, his friends drank coffee, when forced to Craig drank coffee. But he hated the stuff, it had too strong of a taste and always burned his tongue and it was so fucking expensive no matter where you went.

So it wasn't much of a stretch to say that, in a way, Craig hated Tweek Tweak in the way that he hated coffee. Because how much could you hate a caffeinated drink? Neither coffee nor Tweek had ever really done anything to Craig, at least not on purpose, but he thought the world would be better off without either of them. The list of things and people that the world would be better off without was long. Craig was what you might call a list person and he was constantly making new lists of various topics.

People And Things The World Would Be Better Off Without  
1. Eric Cartman  
2. Tweek Tweak and coffee  
3. Any and all romantic comedy movies  
4. French people (with the slight exception of Christophe DeLorne…maybe)  
5. Kyle Broflovski and Stan Marsh  
6. And, honestly, just about everyone else in the world

The fact was though, that this list was made while Craig was in a lighthearted mood and, after the first five things, didn't hold much truth. He had more than enough reason behind those five – past experiences, present experiences, what he was sure would be future experiences – but as for everyone else in the world? Sure they all annoyed him to a certain point, but the world without them? Well, quite frankly, Craig didn't have enough hate in him for that – even if he pretended he did.

God, though, did Tweek ever bother the hell out of Craig Nommel. Ever since, well, what felt like forever. Forever did seem like a long time, too, when one considered that it never really ended. But Craig had shared debate class with Tweek for quite some time now and although it was common to find him both annoyed and amused by the workings of the blond boy it wasn't as common for him to be entirely hateful towards him. Well, maybe a little.

Still, there the blond boy sat, in the center of the room, behind the third tallest person in class. Craig was the second tallest, but knew full well that Tweek would have rather jumped off the Empire State building than to have sat behind him. And, besides, Craig sat in the back row, all the way in the corner. The tallest person in class was – with the aide of high heels – their teacher. At the moment, Tweek was not Craig's problem. He would be, soon, but for right now Craig's problem was his debate teacher.

Most of the teachers at Park High were known to Craig by distinguishing features. His Reading Techniques teachers, for example, was just that guy who with the pathetic comb-over and his Sociology teacher who was kind of Indian looking. Things like that tended to stick out to Craig more than actual names. He even had a list for his teachers, ranking them in order from the one he liked the best to the one he liked the least and, ironically enough, the teacher he liked the least was the only one who's name he had never forgotten.

She was last on the list, the first being his drawing teacher who thought letting them go outside to smoke was part of his job, but she wasn't last without reason. Mrs. Monroe was loud, abrasive and didn't put up with any shit, especially not from defiant seniors with a penchant for flipping people off. Her name was not forgotten for one simple reason and that was reason was Marilyn Monroe. It wasn't even the sex symbol aspect of the famous woman, at least it wasn't just that. Maybe. Well, sex has something to do with it.

But besides making lists about who he didn't like and the best flavors of popsicles (blue was at the top, incidentally) Craig spent a lot of his time sitting around the house watching television. And not just any television. When reruns of Red Racer weren't on Craig watched shows like _Loch Ness Monster: Fact or Myth? _and _What Really Happened September 11th_? Everything always ended in a question mark and Craig liked that. Questions were his forte, even if he didn't always believe the answers given. Fact was, there were quite a few specials on the death of Marilyn Monroe and that was the only reason that Craig dared to remember a teachers name.

Mrs. Monroe had been living forever. Chances were that she hated her own life and Craig hated people like her. The sort of people that didn't like their own life and consequently had the need to make everyone else around them miserable. Then again, that was most people in the world, himself included, so it was possible that Craig hated himself at times.

"Debate assignments today, any volunteers?" Mrs. Monroe asked as she walked into the classroom. Everyone who was talking stopped doing so, Craig leaned forward in his seat so he was just barely visible in his seat. No one answered the question; there were never any volunteers. Mrs. Monroe hardly looked surprised. She was tall, taller than all the freshman at least. Almost as tall as Craig who was cursed with his father's height and his mother's high metabolism, making him look slightly awkward in just how skinny he happened to be. But, as said, the teacher was wearing high heels, it was all just an act for her. Craig wondered sometimes what she was like at home around her husband. He figured she had to be a lot different or else he was simply crazy from her constantly uptight attitude.

"Come on kids, we're doing health debates," she added like that was supposed to excite them. "Alright, no volunteers? How about you, Tweak, hmm?" Tweek Tweak, the little blond gaywad Craig thought, amused as Tweek let out a little cry when the teacher called on him. All the freshman visibly perked up slightly. Debating against Tweek was no challenge, they all seemed sure they could handle it. Craig sniffed at this, he had to wonder who the next poor bastard would be. "Nommel, you'll be for the argument."

"_What_?" Well, Craig certainly hadn't been expecting that. "You didn't even tell us the topic!"

"Topic number one from the sheet you were supposed to pick up from the front table, Mr. Nommel," Mrs. Monroe shot back at him. Craig, not in the mood to actually get up and get the paper, snatched it from the freshman sitting next to him.

"Whoa, are you telling me...," Craig drifted off into a snort of laughter as he read the topic he and Tweek were going to be debating over. "Are you telling _me _that Tweek _Tweak _and I are going to be fighting over the medical affects of..._coffee_? I'm sorry that's just too, like, this is proof. There is a God. Here, kid, have your paper back." He threw the paper back at the freshman who scrambled to grab it before it drifted to the floor.

"Oh, Jesus Christ," he heard Tweek mutter from the center of the classroom. Craig wasn't sure whether the blond said it because he was debating against Craig or because of what they were debating about. Maybe it was a little of both. Craig found it funny either way and didn't try to hide this fact. Tweek was practically a walking example of all the bad things coffee could do to you. All the raven-haired boy had to do was point to his opponent and tell the class that, well, they didn't want to turn out like _that _did they? He would win automatically. Debate was turning out to be the best class ever.

* * *

The rest of the day wasn't much different from any other day. Craig spent most of it feeling rather indifferent. He wrote some poetry in Sociology class and then threw it away because it sounded way too depressing – even for him. The class was not one Craig's favorites, mainly because he shared it with Kyle Broflovski and Stan Marsh. The two weren't exactly mean to Craig in any way, in fact Craig kind of doubted they even had a problem with him. They didn't acknowledge his existance much, that was for sure, but they weren't outwardly rude to him like some people were.

The problem that Craig had with the redhead and his best friend was, well, that. Best friends, Craig had long ago decided, were put on Earth to make everyone without a best friend feel like shit. Especially best friends like Kyle Broflovski and Stan Marsh who were about as close to conjoined twins as you could get without that whole, nasty, conjoined stuff. That was a bit unfair, they were different, somehow, Craig just didn't pay enough attention to know how exactly. With Kyle and Stan they were always so...together.

The teacher would give them a project they had to do with another person. No questions asked, no faltering, nothing – Kyle and Stan were always working together. And where was Craig? Getting awkwardly paired with another group of two people, not just because there was an uneven amount of people in the class, but also because no one wanted to work with him and, arguably, he didn't want to work with anyone else. Group projects, how conformist, they all ended up doing the same thing every time.

So the rest of the day actually was a bit different from any other day. But only because he got put into Kyle and Stan's group this time. Craig was pretty sure Kyle visibly paled when the teacher pushed them together to create a group of three. Stan didn't seem to have much of a problem, maybe because he had fallen into the pool of despair that was the Goth Kid lifestyle years ago, but Craig wasn't really into sympathy, so that didn't help much. Stan stuck to writing things down from the book, Craig stuck to looking disinterested and Kyle stuck to being an asshole, complete with muttering things under his breath.

"Are either of you actually going to do anything?" Stan had finally asked, turning a page in the book and looking up at them, after about twenty minutes of the other two simply sitting there.

"I'm not," Kyle said in answer. He was, after all, the only person who's temper was a near equal to Craig's. They all knew it, everyone who knew Kyle. Everyone had been on the receiving end of his bad mood at some point and no one enjoyed it. Craig's bad mood was perpetual, even when he was in a good mood there were undertones of his annoyance at the world. Kyle exploded often – with anger, you pervs – and there wasn't much warning. People like Stan who were around the redhead more often than not were obviously used to it, but some people simply couldn't understand why anyone wanted to be his friend.

Craig was used to it and he still didn't understand why anyone would want to be Kyle's friend.

During lunch Craig was informed that they were going for coffee later. Crag was informed of this every day at lunch and every day at lunch he refused to go. Most of the time they listened to him, they respected what he had to say and, if not completely skipping going to get coffee, they would put up with walking the longer distance to one of the diners to get some instead of going to Harbucks. But that time when Craig shook his head in answer to Sid's suggestion they all looked at each other. Georgie, who had walked over from the middle school to make the group complete, was the first one to speak up.

"We used to go to Harbucks all the time, Craig, and we haven't gone in a really long time, it's kind of getting, well, it's getting a bit conformist to not go, if you see what I mean." Craig glared at him, resisting the urge to flip him off. The youngest member of their group looked to the other two for support. Henrietta sighed and pulled Craig to the side, as was tradition. Out of the whole group Craig found her to be the most tolerable. Somewhere between fourth grade and now she had started to become a bit less despairing, not completely of course, but Craig found that they could at least have a conversation without mentioning 'conformists' every few sentences.

"Just go along with it, alright?" she hissed at him. "You know Georgie's just talking for Sid, anyway, and you know how Sid feels about you." Craig did, indeed, know how Sid felt about him. Sid did not like him and the feeling was mutual. They were friends by association and there wasn't much more to it than that. Given the choice Craig probably would have kicked Sid's ass, or at least tried to. But, as Henrietta had once pointed out, they had an obligation to stick together whether they were happy about it or not. Craig grudgingly agreed to this. There weren't many people he trusted in the world, but the Goth girl was one of them.

"You know how much I hate that place," Craig reminded her. Henrietta didn't need to be reminded. They all knew. But in the end there he was, after school, walking with them to Harbucks, arms crossed angrily and nails digging into his skin.

"Craig, you need to stop being so easy to read," Henrietta advised him.

"I am _not _easy to read," Craig replied defiantly, glaring at the girl who was walking next to him.

"Are you kidding me?" Sid said, turning around from where he was walking a few feet in front of them. Georgie snorted into his hand but didn't even bother looking back. "You're like a slut book or something, everyone's checked you out and read you cover to cover."

"You are kind of a slut book," Henrietta said with a small smile.

Craig Nommel, slut book extraordinaire, proceeded to flip them off and, in doing so, proved their point without even saying a word.

**A/N**: Honestly...don't ask about 'slut book.' I don't think I could give you an answer that would make much sense. Just know that I will be calling people slut books from now on. Admit it, if anyone is a slut book, it's so Craig Nommel. And maybe Kyle. And maybe all of them. But God if that's the case, I love slut books.  
So, the next chapter will be from eksley05 and you'll get to see what Tweek's up to. I think you'll be pleasently surprised by who he's become friends with and how he feels about Craig...hmm.  
So a review or two would be nice, but you know the drill...  
Until next time, tweekers


	2. Chapter 2

**Color and Contrast**

**A/N****: **Yo, guys, it's me – eksley05 - now, with the introduction of Tweek, to this hopefully-crazy-epic story. I'm kind of sorry about the length of this chapter, except not really, because I'm epically proud of it. Longest chapter I've ever written for anything, and all. You know how that is.

**Chapter Two: **On A Day Like Today

Tweek Tweak liked routine. He liked things to be the same, all the time. After all, if nothing ever changed, that meant there would never be any unexpected events he had to worry about. It had taken him years to be able to manage the level of stress his life currently held. Anything out of the ordinary was just, just _way _too much pressure.

He didn't own an alarm clock, but he woke up at the same time every morning, six AM, weekday or weekend. Well, if it could be called waking up; Tweek didn't really sleep, not the way most people slept, anyway. Sure, he closed his eyes, and drifted off in the darkness of his room every night, but he never managed to fully fall asleep. He just couldn't relax completely. He was always alert, always hyperaware of everything around him, and the slightest noise would cause him to jolt upright and reach beside him for the ever-present mug of coffee on his nightstand, to calm his nerves. Every time this happened—at least four times a night—his eyes would dart fearfully around his room, stopping first on his window, which was _always _closed, and locked; then his bedroom door, with the three locks that only his parents had keys to; and finally, his closet, the only thing he couldn't get a lock for, which also happened to be the one thing he desperately _wanted _a lock for most. The metal doors were old, rusted, and permanently stuck open, giving Tweek a clear view into the closet's depths. He'd scrunch himself up in the corner, where his bed met the wall, and wrap himself tightly in his blankets, shivering in terror, unable to avert his eyes from the third-scariest thing in the world.

Tweek hated his closet, and closets in general. Everyone knew closets had _things_ in them, things with scales and teeth and _claws, _that would drag you in there with them and do horrible things to you. Tweek could swear that the last time his mom had left him to put his own laundry away, he'd heard something moving around, even though it was daylight and his whole closet was lit up. So what if he couldn't see them? Tweek knew that that just meant that whatever the scaly, fanged, clawed things were that were in there were also _invisible._ And if they were in _his _closet, there was nothing stopping them from being in every closet in town. There had to be hundreds of them, lurking in closets everywhere, with their underground closet tunnels that they used to move around and communicate with each other. Oh, God, they were probably formulating a plan to rise up out of the closets and take over South Park, and make everyone their slaves and nobody could stop them, nobody could _see _them if they were invisible, Jesus, he needed _coffee_. And, just like all the other times before, Tweek would find the courage to reach for his mug of coffee, his need for it _just _outweighing his fear of the Closet Monsters. Once he had the caffeine in his system, he could settle down for at least another ten minutes of restless pseudo-sleep.

His parents, the only people other than Tweek himself who understood the endless need for the caffeinated beverage, had gotten him a small coffeepot for his birthday the year before, which he also kept, as well as multiple bags of Harbucks coffee grounds, on his nightstand, lest he wake up in the middle of the night and find his mug empty of the only thing that had a hope of even slightly calming him down.

If it was a weekday, Tweek would jump out of bed, put on a fresh pot of coffee, and snatch up an armful of the nearest available clothing he could find that was the farthest away from his closet. He would then unlock the locks on his bedroom door, and cross the hall to the bathroom, where there was always a clean towel hanging on the rack so he didn't have to open the doors to the hall closet to get one. Locking the door behind him, he would step carefully into the bathtub, pull the shower curtain halfway closed—halfway, so he could keep an eye on the door, just in case someone or something got past the lock—and turn on the water, each tap turned exactly halfway so Tweek's showers were never so hot they scalded his pale skin, and never so cold he froze to death. And they were always exactly twelve minutes long.

After twelve minutes, he'd shut off the water, hop out of the tub, and wrap himself in the towel. He would think about using his mom's hairdryer to dry his dripping blond hair, but never actually do it—he might get water on the cord and electrocute himself, or hold it too close to his hair and set himself on _fire_, or get his hair _stuck_ and then he'd have to go to school with a hairdryer stuck to his head and have to explain why he was using a hairdryer in the first place. Hairdryers were a _girl _thing. None of the other guys used them—except maybe Butters, but everyone knew what Butters was like—and Tweek didn't want to have yet another thing that made him stand out. Especially nothing that made him stand out in _that _way, Christ, he wasn't _like _that, he told himself every morning as he dried his hair furiously with whatever towel he was using and pulled on the clothes he'd grabbed on his way out of his room. He'd given up on actually _brushing _his hair; he just let it do what it wanted. Even if he did manage to comb out all the tangles, by the end of the day it looked the same as it would have had he just left it alone, so that's what he had taken to doing.

After a shower, he'd take his coffee bean pajamas—courtesy of Harbucks, like most of the things Tweek owned—and towel with him to his room, where he'd drop them in the laundry basket beside his door. His mom did his laundry on Thursdays; Tweek knew how to work the washing machine, but the Tweak's washer and dryer were in the basement, and he never, _ever _set foot in his basement, not since seventh grade. He would then pour himself a mug of coffee from his bedside coffeepot, and proceed to neatly make his bed, a process that took longer for Tweek than it would for the average person; his constant twitchiness made even simple things like making his bed difficult.

Once he got downstairs, he would have between nine and thirteen minutes to greet his parents, get his things together, fill his silver thermos full of coffee from the kitchen coffeepot, tie his shoes, forget and then at the last minute remember to grab his lunch that he'd made the night before, and make it to the corner at the end of his street, where the school bus would come to take him to Park High. He had enough coffee in his thermos to last him the morning, and he got it refilled at the end of lunch. After school, he got off the bus two stops earlier than he'd gotten on, so he could go to work at Harbucks until ten, and then his mom would come pick him up—because Tweek was afraid of being outside in the dark; there were too many things that could happen to a person walking outside alone in the middle of the night—and take him home, where he would have some coffee and something to eat, and be in bed by eleven, so he could wake up the next day and do it all over again.

Weekends were only slightly different. On Saturdays, instead of standing at the corner waiting for the school bus, Tweek turned right, and walked the four blocks to Harbucks where he spent eight hours. He had Saturday afternoons and the entire day on Sundays free (he still woke up at six AM on his days off, but that was simply because his body wouldn't let him sleep any later) and it was then that he would spend time outside of school with his one and only good friend, perhaps—though it was too much pressure for Tweek to have the label on the relationship—his best friend.

It was the same thing, day after day, week after week; life was a blur of school, work, and coffee, and he liked it that way. Tweek had his routine, and nothing ever changed.

Until today.

Tweek had known from the second he got out of bed and accidentally knocked his half-full-of-cold-coffee mug off his nightstand that today was going to be too much to handle. Had known from the night before, to be one hundred percent honest. Harbucks had been unnaturally busy for a Tuesday night; Tweek had still been serving customers right up until ten o'clock on the dot, and then he'd had to clean up the place and get everything ready for his dad to come in to work the next morning, and the whole time he was painfully aware that his mom was waiting for him in the car, outside, and that he was taking too long to mop the floor and refill the napkin dispensers, and Christ, his mom was a nice woman but even her patience had its limits, and _why_ couldn't he fill the sugar container fast enough, oh, Jesus, now he had sugar all over the floor and he was going to take even longer, and his mom was going to drive away and he would have to walk home in the dark by himself and he would probably get ab_duc_ted, oh, _God_.

It was already ten-thirty when he finally finished cleaning. By the time he set the alarm with shaking hands, and managed to locate his key to the store, Tweek had convinced himself that he was going to have to sprint home, to at least have some chance of avoiding the ninjas lurking in the bushes, waiting to launch an attack on him. He had just locked the front door of Harbucks when he heard a noise behind him and whirled around, pure panic in his eyes, but it was only his mom, pulling their blue van right up beside the doors. Tweek relaxed only slightly, grateful that at least he didn't have to walk home and have to worry about the ninjas, but knowing that his whole routine would be thrown off.

He just hadn't realized how much.

It started this Wednesday morning with the coffee stain that was slowly spreading across his carpet. All the carpeting in the Tweak house was coffee-coloured anyway, so it actually wasn't that noticeable, but Tweek spent a good fifteen minutes scrubbing at it with one of the towels he had in his room from earlier in the week, convinced that if he didn't clean it up and his parents saw it, they would take his bedroom coffeemaker away and he would never be able to wake up in the middle of the night and make coffee without ever leaving his room ever again. A life without coffee; that was Tweek's second-greatest fear.

After getting as much of the coffee out of his carpet as was possible, at least for the time being, Tweek threw the towel in the laundry basket and looked around his room for some clean clothes. He found a wrinkled pair of jeans on the floor half-underneath his bed, and one green sock, one white sock, and a pair of plain black boxers in a heap underneath his desk, but no shirt. His heart raced as he threw the found items of clothing onto his bed and took a couple of halting steps across his room toward his closet, freezing as he saw the shadow of _something _move inside it. A squeak of fright escaped his lips, and he immediately clapped a hand over his mouth, praying that the Closet Monsters hadn't heard him, hadn't noticed him. He really, _really _did _not _want to have to put his arm inside his closet to grab a clean shirt; they would _definitely _notice him then.

His eyes darted towards the laundry basket. There had to be a – no, he remembered, the slight glimmer of hope in his clear green eyes dimming. All of the shirts currently in his dirty laundry basket were, actually, dirty, covered in coffee stains. The last week had not been a good one for Tweek when it came to not spilling coffee on himself. He had no choice. He had to face his closet.

Slowly, trying his hardest to be completely silent, he shuffled across his carpet until he stood directly in front of the rack of clean clothes inside the home of the Closet Monsters. Squeezing his eyes shut, he took a deep breath and flung his arm inside the closet, grabbing the first item of clothing he felt his fingers make contact with, and pulling his arm back just as quickly, leaping back and almost falling in his haste to get away from what he was _sure _had been a Closet Monster brushing his arm with a sharp claw. He stumbled backwards a few steps before he hit his bed and collapsed, trembling like crazy, onto the soft surface, and only then did he open his eyes to see what he held in his tightly clenched fist.

The way the morning had started, Tweek was somehow not surprised to see that he'd managed to grab the one shirt he owned that he _never _wore in public, ever. It was fine to wear it around the house, his parents didn't comment on it—they had been the ones to buy it for him, after all—but there was no way he would ever, of his own volition, be caught dead wearing this particular shirt anywhere other than inside his own home. Not just because it was bright, almost neon green, and would definitely attract attention, and not just because it happened to be a Power Rangers T-shirt—retro was trendy, these days, after all. No, the reason Tweek kept the shirt hidden from sight of all living, breathing beings except for his parents—and the Closet Monsters, of course—was because it was so obviously a children's shirt, from Walmart, from _fourth grade_. And everyone would _know _it had been from fourth grade, since most of the boys in Mr. Garrison's class had all owned the same exact shirt, and everyone would know that Tweek still fit into clothes he'd had when he was _nine_. Christ, that was all he needed, like he wasn't enough of a freak and an outcast already. The shirt had been a little too big for him back then, but it fit him perfectly now, because, unlike most of his classmates, Tweek had barely grown at all in the years between fourth grade and senior year. He had gotten taller, of course, but not much; he was just barely five foot two, and only a hundred and five pounds.

He didn't like being so small and skinny; it wasn't something he'd done on purpose. He wasn't anorexic or anything like that; he made sure to eat, twice a day at the very least. He never ate breakfast; the idea of food that early in the morning made his stomach hurt. Coffee was all the breakfast he needed. But still. He ate. He didn't want to _starve _himself to death; that would be a horrible way to die, Jesus, just getting skinnier and skinnier until you were nothing but a skeleton, your bones poking through your skin and you wouldn't even have enough energy to _breathe_, and then you just _died_. Tweek was pretty sure that was where skeleton Halloween decorations came from.

With a sudden twitch, he groaned, knowing he didn't have time to brave another trip inside his closet. He barely even had enough time to shower, Jesus Christ, he had to have a shower, he was running out of time, what if the bus came early and he missed it, he'd have to walk to school and he would be late and get detention, which meant he wouldn't make it to work on time and his dad would be there all by himself and oh God, what if Harbucks _exploded_? Tweek scrambled to his feet, nearly tripping over one of his blankets he'd kicked off sometime in the middle of the night and grabbed the other clothes he'd thrown on his bed. He managed to unlock his door and make it inside his bathroom in less than thirty seconds, a new record. It was only after he'd stepped into the tub and turned the water on, and had moved to halfway-close the shower curtain, that he realized there was no towel on the rack.

He had a small anxiety attack, just standing there under the stream of water, staring at the empty rack. There was no – but there was _always _a towel, _always_, what did an empty rack _mean_? Somebody was stealing towels, there was a towel thief on the loose, oh, God, that meant that a stranger had gotten inside his house and – wait, he hadn't seen his parents yet this morning, oh Christ, what if the towel thief killed his parents and _then _stole all the towels? Or what if, he thought to himself, his eyes growing wider than seemed humanly possible, what if the towel was _alive_? What if it had just gotten up by itself and jumped off the rack and was now lurking somewhere in his bathroom, what if it was, oh God, Jesus, what if it was sitting up on the curtain rod waiting to jump down on him? He was almost hyperventilating now. He backed up in the tub as far as he could go, slowly raising his head when he hit the wall, shaking so violently it was a miracle he managed to stay standing. Seeing nothing, he calmed down only slightly. The Closet Monsters were invisible; maybe they'd taught the towel how to become invisible too. Tweek wanted to get out of his bathroom before the invisible towel _got _him, but he was already in the shower, and he needed to wash his hair, since he hadn't the night before, and he was pretty sure he still had bits of coffee grounds in it. Squeezing his eyes tightly shut, he leaned forward until his head was directly underneath the water gushing from the showerhead, praying that he lived through the process.

Fifteen minutes later—three minutes longer than usual—Tweek emerged from the shower, shivering, and grabbed his pajama shirt, the nearest available thing he could dry himself off with. By the time he was dressed, both his pajama shirt and pants were soaking wet, and he hadn't even started on drying his hair. He couldn't go outside with wet hair, Christ, he would get pneumonia, but there was nothing else to dry his hair with but—

He reached into the cupboard underneath the bathroom sink and pulled out his mom's hairdryer. After examining it for seven long minutes he couldn't really afford to waste, Tweek plugged it into the wall and switched it on, jumping at the sudden noise. Jesus Christ, it was loud, and _hot_, he felt like his scalp was going to burn off, how did girls _do _this? He squinted, trying to see his reflection through the condensation on the mirror. What was he _doing _to himself, oh God, he was going to look so stupid, why hadn't he just dried his hair first, that would have been so much better, he wouldn't have had to use this hairdryer, he was probably going to burn the _house _down.

It took another five minutes for Tweek to finish drying his hair, and another minute and a half before he managed to turn the hairdryer off and shove it back underneath the sink. Some condensation had disappeared from mirror, so he could see himself somewhat. His hair looked, if possible, messier than ever before and, well, _poofier._ Tweek groaned again, unlocking the bathroom door and making his way back to his bedroom. That was really just, just _great_, now he was going to have poofy hair all day. At least, he supposed, he still _had _hair, and hadn't managed to burn it all off. He tossed his wet pajamas into his laundry basket and moved towards his coffeemaker, realizing at the last second that he hadn't pushed the button to start making the coffee before he'd gone to the shower. He whimpered, and sat down on the edge of his bed, staring forlornly at the little glass coffeepot.

Today just wasn't his day. Deciding to just forgo making his bed for the day, Tweek went downstairs to the kitchen, where his parents were both drinking coffee at the table. Grateful that at least they had remembered to actually make the, for the Tweaks, essential morning beverage, Tweek mumbled a hello to both of them, filling his silver thermos and a mug full of coffee. He set his thermos on the counter beside the refrigerator, taking his mug with him to go collect his school things from the living room. His dad looked up from the newspaper he was reading as Tweek re-entered the kitchen.

"Tweek," he said, and Tweek yelped in surprise, almost dropping his backpack and spilling his coffee all over the kitchen floor.

"Wh – what?!" he stuttered, gulping down a mouthful of Harbucks Special Blend.

"Do you think you could get out of school early, son? I have some things I need to get done today, so I'm going to need you to start work an hour early." Mr. Tweak sipped from his mug of coffee, not noticing the look of horror Tweek was giving him.

"I – ghh!" Tweek finished off his mug of coffee and, after rinsing out the mug, set it beside the sink. Get out _early_? But that would mean missing his last class, and telling his History teacher than he couldn't be there because he had to work, and God, his history teacher was so, so _tall,_ and he always looked so _angry_. Tweek tried so hard to just stay out of Mr. Langdon's way, but this meant he was going to have to actually talk to him, Christ, that was _way _too much pressure, especially for a day like today. And then he would have to work for an extra _hour, _Jesus, he really didn't think he would be able to handle that, but he couldn't say _no, _this was his dad. "I guess so," he squeaked. Catching sight of the clock, he gasped. He was going to miss the bus if he didn't hurry, he had four minutes to make it to the corner, he had to leave _now_. Clutching his thermos of coffee tightly in one hand and his backpack in the other, he slipped on his sneakers, not even stopping to tie them—he didn't have _time_—and rushed out the door, barely even hearing his parents call goodbye to him.

The school bus pulled up to Park High at seven-ten, exactly ten minutes before classes started, and nine minutes later than it usually got there, due to a ridiculous amount of construction work being done on the roads. Tweek tripped getting off the bus, of course—it was that kind of day—but was somehow able to keep a hold of his thermos. Small miracles, and all that. Another small miracle came in the form of his not needing to go to the other side of the school to get anything out of his locker; everything he needed for his morning classes was safely inside his backpack, which he carried on one shoulder. He did realize, though, walking through the door of Mrs. Monroe's classroom and taking his seat in the exact center of the room, that he had forgotten his lunch. He sighed a tiny, sad sigh, as he unscrewed the lid of his thermos and took a long gulp, savouring the rich coffee taste. At least he had his coffee. Even he could survive Debate class if he had coffee. Or so he'd thought.

* * *

Tweek watched the espresso machine five feet away from him with wide, frightened eyes, not wanting to move any closer. The machine was currently rattling and clanking and making high-pitched whining noises, and Tweek was pretty sure that it had gotten possessed by something, and if he went any closer, then whatever had possessed the machine could possess _him_, and make him do horrible things to people, because that's what happened when a person got possessed. Christ, it would probably make him kill people by scalding them to death with burning hot coffee, and Tweek didn't want to be a _murderer_, Jesus Christ, if he became possessed and started killing people he would go to _jail _for the rest of his _life_, he would _die _there, in a cold dark cell with no _coffee_. But it would be coffee that put him in jail, he would be the Espresso Murderer, but it wouldn't be his fault, but nobody would believe him if he told them he was possessed by the Harbucks espresso machine, they would think he was _crazy_.

As scared as he was of the espresso machine, though, there was one thing on Tweek's mind that was interfering the most with his ability to function properly at his job. That was the fact that that morning, in Debate class, he had been paired up with Craig Nommel to debate the medical effects of coffee on the human body. He shouldn't have even been in Debate class, but the school had messed up somewhere along the line during registration and he hadn't been able to change it because all the other classes he could have possibly taken were already full. So he'd wound up in Debate class, the only senior in a class full of freshman, except for the one person who Tweek would do anything to avoid.

Craig Nommel was Tweek's greatest fear. He could never put into words what it was, specifically, about the other boy that terrified him so much, he just knew the feeling of mind-numbing fear when he felt it. He was more afraid of Craig than he was of the Closet Monsters, of invisible demon towels, and even running out of coffee. Just looking at Craig made Tweek want to put as much distance between him and the other boy as possible. He _knew _Craig hated him, he could feel it whenever he and Craig were ever in the same room. He probably wished Tweek was dead, probably wished he could be the one to make it happen. He probably _could_, he hung out with the Goth Kids all the time, he'd even _become_ one of them, and Tweek was sure they all worshipped Satan and sat in the dark in their houses sacrificing things and doing all sorts of horrible devil chants. If Craig wanted Tweek dead, the others probably wanted Tweek dead too and Christ, it wasn't like there were a lot of people who would miss him.

The point was, Tweek tried to stay out of Craig's way, because maybe that way, he would be able to go unnoticed by the other boy, and live a little while longer. But now, now he had to _debate _with him, about _coffee _of all things, and even though Tweek knew more about coffee than he knew about himself, the whole idea of having to debate about it with Craig _Nommel_ was just, way too much pressure, more pressure than he could handle. He didn't even know how he'd managed to make it through the rest of the day at school; it had all gone by in a blur, the only thing Tweek could think about was what was going to happen during that debate, and whether or not he would still be alive at the end of it.

The espresso machine stopped its demonic sputtering and Tweek inched closer, peering at it carefully, uncertain as to whether or not he should try to touch it, in case he broke it, or unleashed the demon within. Maybe he should tell his parents he was coming down with something, maybe he could just not go to school that day, but then, oh God, he would probably fail the class for not showing up and he couldn't afford to fail it, he needed that class to graduate, and he didn't want to be the only senior left behind. Wanting to cry, Tweek reached out to poke at the espresso machine with a shaking finger when a loud shout of, "_Shit_!" from the front counter made him jump.

"Grrrgh!" he yelped in response, stumbling up to the counter. He poured himself a cup of coffee from the pot beside him—that was his favourite thing about working at Harbucks: he got all the free coffee he wanted—and offered his best friend a shaky smile.

Thomas' hands were covering his mouth, and his face was bright red. As always, there were dark circles under his eyes. Thomas was the only person other than Tweek who really understood how it felt to every so often blurt out a word, or a noise that he hadn't meant to. They'd bonded over that, Thomas's Tourette 's syndrome and Tweek's caffeine-induced outbursts, the day after Thomas had transferred to Park High in tenth grade. Everyone else avoided them like the plague, though Stan, Kyle, Clyde, and a few others were never blatantly cruel; they would even sometimes hold entire conversations with Tweek or Thomas during class, or lunchtime, or even in the halls. When it came down to it though, each one of the blond boys was the other's only friend.

"S – sorry," he said through the fingers of his right hand, reaching up to run a hand through his dark blond hair with his left. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"Ngh." Tweek shook his head, his left eye twitching. "No, it's – it's okay. I just – ghh! – had a really st - stressful day." Tilting his head to the side slightly, he said, "You weren't in school today."

Thomas shook his head. "I had ther – _cock!_ – therapy today," he mumbled. "My mom thinks it'll help. _Shit_!"

"Does it?" Tweek placed a Harbucks cup underneath the spout of one of the many beverage dispensers and pushed the button that would fill it with hot chocolate, pushing it across the counter to Thomas when it was full.

The other blond boy accepted it gratefully. Thomas didn't really like coffee, but he drank a lot of hot chocolate. He shrugged, reaching into his pocket for some money. "Maybe a little. I can—" He clamped both hands over his mouth and yelled something muffled into them, then continued, "I can almost tell when – when it's going to happen so I can control it better."

"Don't – don't worry about that," Tweek said, gesturing to the five dollar bill in Thomas' hand. "It's free."

"Thanks," Thomas said, smiling as he shoved the cash back into his pocket. "I should get – get home, though, I just wanted to come say hi since I missed school."

"You'll be – ngh! – you'll be there tomorrow, right?" Tweek had had to sit alone at lunch today and he didn't like the idea of having to do it again. He was relieved when Thomas nodded.

"Yeah, I—" He muffled the outburst with his hands again. "I'll be there." He picked up the cup of hot chocolate and waved at Tweek as he headed for the door.

Tweek waved back and watched his best friend walk past a group of people on his way to the door, but it wasn't until Thomas was gone completely that he looked up and nearly had a heart attack right there in Harbucks. Craig Nommel and the rest of the Goth Kids were standing in front of the counter, oh, Jesus, they'd come to get him, to kill him, this was it, he was going to die, at least he was going to die surrounded by coffee. Would he get coffee in the afterlife? Oh, God, he hoped so.

"Um, excuse me?" the only girl of the group said. Tweek didn't know any of their names except for Craig's.

He fought to keep himself under some semblance of control. "Ghh! H – how can I help y – you?" he stuttered. His voice, his whole self, was shaking uncontrollably.

One of the other guys, the one with the long red and black bangs whispered something to Craig and then snickered to himself, but Craig didn't even crack a smile. He remained still, leaning against the counter and glaring up at the Harbucks menu on the wall like it had personally offended him in some way. The girl sighed, and rolled her eyes.

"Could we get some coffee?" she asked, sounding extremely bored. "Black coffee. Four of them."

Oh, Christ, thank God, they just wanted coffee, they weren't here to kill him. Not yet, anyway, Tweek thought as he frantically tried to get the four of them their coffees as fast as he could. The faster he got their coffee, the faster they would be away from the counter and away from him and all he wanted at the moment was for them to be away from him. But, oh Jesus, he thought, pouring coffee into the first of four Harbucks cups he'd set on the counter, what if they were just here for coffee _first, _what if they planned on killing him _after _they drank their coffee? It was a Wednesday, nobody came to Harbucks on Wednesdays, there would be no witnesses, and—

The espresso machine suddenly let out a loud, angry-sounding gurgle, and Tweek jumped. The coffeepot he had been holding slipped from his grasp and flew into the air, coming down hard on the counter, shattering into a million pieces. And also, in the process, drenching Craig's entire right side with nearly-scalding hot coffee.

The black-haired boy let out a loud, "_Fuck_!" that echoed throughout Harbucks. Tweek was frozen in place, too terrified to even move. Oh, _Christ_, he'd just spilled _coffee _on _Craig_. He was _definitely _going to die now. Oh, God, he wished he could disappear, just blink out of existence like he had never been a part of the world, never been born. Craig's eyes met his and Tweek flinched at the fury in them, like, oh God, maybe spikes were going to shoot out of Craig's eyes, maybe that was one of the powers a person got when they became one of the Goth Kids. Tweek shut his own eyes tightly and braced himself for whatever Craig was going to do to him, but the wrath he was expecting never came.

After a few seconds, he opened one of his eyes just a crack, and saw the girl tugging on Craig's non-coffee-drenched sleeve, pulling him away from the counter. It took a minute, but eventually Craig allowed her to lead him away, to one of the tables. The other two were still standing at the counter, looking at Tweek expectantly. Trembling, Tweek somehow managed to pick up a second coffeepot and shakily finish pouring coffee for the group of four, only spilling a small amount of coffee this time. Each of the two remaining Goth Kids picked up two cups and coffee and turned to leave. As they walked away, the one with red and black bangs shot over his shoulder, "God, what a fucking spaz."

His friend replied with a simple, "Yeah."

Tweek turned around to face the espresso machine, leaning against the counter for support. It was all the machine's fault, it and its demon. Why couldn't Harbucks just have a normal espresso machine? Why did it have to be haunted? Tears filled his eyes, and Tweek slowly slid down the counter until he was sitting on the floor. In the back of his mind he knew he should be cleaning up the spilled coffee and broken glass, but he just didn't have it in him to face the Goth Kids yet.

He couldn't even pour Craig Nommel a cup of coffee, how was he ever going to be able to debate against him?


End file.
